Blossom Time was first produced on Broadway on September 29, 1921 and proved so successful that to meet the demand for tickets a second company was formed to perform it at a nearby theater. There were also four national companies running simultaneously. This musical was derived from the successful German operetta, Das drei Maederlhaus, adapted by Dorothy Donnelly. The central character is the beloved Viennese composer of the early 19th century, Franz Schubert, and the plot is built around the composer’s supposed frustrated love for Mitzi, who, in turn, falls in love with Schubert’s best friend. The composer’s anguish in losing her makes it impossible for him to finish the symphony he was writing for her—and it remains forever unfinished. This tragic episode, however, has no basis in biographical fact and is entirely the figment of a fertile operetta librettist’s imagination.
Romberg’s most famous songs were all based on Schubert’s own melodies, and one became a hit of major proportions: “Song of Love” based on the beautiful main theme from the first movement of the Unfinished Symphony. Other popular selections include “Tell Me Daisy,” “Lonely Hearts,” “Serenade” and “Three Little Maids”—all possessed of that charm, grace and Gemuetlichkeit which we always associate with the city of Vienna and its popular music.
The Desert Song, produced on November 30, 1926, had for its background the colorful setting of French Morocco. There Margot Bonvalet is in love with the Governor’s son but is being pursued by the bandit chief, The Red Shadow. In the end it turns out that the Governor’s son and The Red Shadow are one and the same person. The principal musical excerpts include the romantic duet of Margot and The Red Shadow, “Blue Heaven”; the rapturous love song of The Red Shadow, “One Alone”; and two virile episodes, “Sabre Song” and “French Marching Song.”
Unlike most Romberg operettas, Maytime, presented on August 16, 1917, did not have a foreign or exotic setting. The action takes place in Gramercy Park, New York, between 1840 and 1900. However, the tragic frustrations of the love affair of Ottilie and Richard belong inevitably in the make-believe world of the operetta. Ottilie is forced to marry a distant relative. Many years later, Ottilie’s granddaughter and Richard’s grandson find each other, fall in love, and fulfil the happiness denied their grandparents. The most important musical number in this play is the sweet and sentimental waltz, “Will You Remember?”, which is repeated several times during the course of the action. Other numbers include “Jump Jim Crow,” “It’s a Windy Day” and “Dancing Will Keep You Young.”
The New Moon—which came to Broadway on September 19, 1928—was described by its authors (Oscar Hammerstein II, Frank Mandel, and Laurence Schwab) as a “romantic musical comedy.” Its hero is a historical character, Robert Mission, an 18th-century French aristocrat who has come to New Orleans as a political fugitive. In the operetta he is a bondservant to Monsieur Beaunoir, with whose daughter, Marianne, he is in love. When the French police arrive to take him back to Paris for trial, Marianne boards his ship upon which a mutiny erupts on the high seas. The victorious bondservants now take possession of a small island off the coast of Florida where they set up their own government with Robert as leader, who then takes Marianne as his wife. This opulent score yields one of Romberg’s most beautiful love songs, “Lover Come Back to Me,” but it is significant to point out that its main melody was expropriated by Romberg from a piano piece by Tchaikovsky. Other delightful musical excerpts from this tuneful operetta include the tender ballads “Softly as in a Morning Sunrise,” “One Kiss” and “Wanting You,” and the stirring male chorus, “Stout-Hearted Men.”
The Student Prince, like Blossom Time, was based on a successful German operetta, Old Heidelberg, once again adapted for the American stage by Dorothy Donnelly. Its first performance took place on December 2, 1924. It has become one of the best loved operettas of the American theater; there is hardly a time when it is not revived somewhere in the United States. The setting is the romantic German University town of Heidelberg in 1860. Prince Karl Franz falls in love with Kathie, a waitress at the local inn. Their romance, however, is doomed to frustration, since the Prince must renounce her to marry a Princess. Romberg’s music is a veritable cornucopia of melodic riches, including as it does the love duet of Kathie and the Prince, “Deep in My Heart,” the Prince’s love song “Serenade,” and with them, “Golden Days” and a vibrant male chorus, “Drinking Song.”
David Rose
David Rose was born in London, England, on June 15, 1910. His family came to the United States in 1914, settling in Chicago where Rose received his musical training at the Chicago Musical College. After working for radio and as pianist of the Ted Fiorito Orchestra, Rose came to Hollywood in 1938 where he became music director of the Mutual Broadcasting network. During World War II he served as musical director of, and composer for, Winged Victory, the Air Corps production by Moss Hart. After the war, Rose became outstandingly successful as musical director for leading radio and television programs (including the first Fred Astaire television show for which he received an “Emmy” Award), and as a composer of background music for many motion pictures. He has also appeared extensively in America and Europe as guest conductor of symphony orchestras.
Rose is the composer of several instrumental compositions in a popular style that have achieved considerable popularity. Indeed, it was with one of these that he first became famous as a composer. This was the Holiday for Strings, written and published in 1943, a three-part composition in which the flanking sections make effective use of plucked strings while the middle part is of lyrical character. Holiday for Strings received over a dozen different recordings and sold several million records. Fifteen years later, Rose wrote another charming composition in a similar vein, Holiday for Trombones in which virtuosity is contrasted with lyricism. Other instrumental works by Rose outstanding for either melodic or rhythmic interest are Big Ben, Dance of the Spanish Onion, Escapade, and Our Waltz.